The Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), has expressed deep concern over the continued uptick in inflation (year-on-year) and its impact on consumers’ spending and manufacturing activities in the country.

Director-General of the Chamber, Dr. Chinyere Almona, said following nine consecutive months of acceleration, the outlook for inflation appears negative.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed that inflation rate (year-on-year) continued to increase, rising to 26.72 per cent in September from 25.80 per cent in August, implying 0.92 per cent points increase, and 5.94 per cent points when compared to 20.77 recorded in the corresponding month in 2022.

On a monthly basis, consumer prices rose by 2.1 per cent in September, following a 3.2 per cent surge in the prior month. This, she said, was largely driven by an increase in food and core inflation.

“Food inflation rate increased to 30.64 per cent in the month, implying 1.30 per cent points increase from 29.37 per cent in the previous month and 7.30 per cent points increase compared to 23.34 per cent points in the corresponding month in 2022. Similarly, core inflation increased to 21.84 per cent, 0.69 per cent point and 4.35 per cent points increase when compared to 21.15 per cent and 17.49 per cent in August 2023 and September 2022 respectively.

“In terms of contributions of items, the data revealed that food and non-alcoholic beverages contributed the highest to the price increase at 13.84 per cent followed by housing water, electricity, gas and other fuel (4.47 per cent), clothing and footwear (2.04 per cent), transport (1.74 per cent) and furnishings and household equipment and maintenance (1.34 per cent),” NBS stated.

Regretting the dire situation, Almona said they anticipate economic policymakers to give priority to inflation as well as businesses in the short term to implement a variety of cost reduction strategies, including downsizing and local sourcing of input factors as they bid to lower operating expenses.

She added that the chamber recommends that the government focuses its efforts on boosting supply rather than a decline in demand.

Alumona also implored the government to address the challenges inhibiting domestic production and ease the bottlenecks to the distribution of goods within the country.

“Further, we urge the government to continue to address the problems of insecurity and other factors affecting agriculture productivity in the country to improve food supply. Finally, LCCI urges the CBN to improve the flow of credit to the real economy,” she said.